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Longmont movie theater, mall's last day is Sunday

4:40 showing will be final act for UA Twin Peaks 10 and Twin Peaks Mall

By Tony Kindelspire

Times-Call staff writer

Posted:
07/16/2014 01:11:18 PM MDT

Updated:
07/16/2014 01:51:29 PM MDT

Movie-goers in line at the UA Twin Peaks 10 theater inside Twin Peaks Mall are shown in this Times-Call file photo. Regal, which owns the theater, has announced that Sunday will be the theater's last day, also marking the final day of business for Twin Peaks Mall. (Times-Call file)

Regal Entertainment Group, owner of the UA Twin Peaks 10 theater inside Twin Peaks Mall, has announced that after Sunday, the screens will go dark. The final movie, "Tammy," which begins at 4:40 p.m., will be the final act for the mall, which is being demolished and turned into Village at the Peaks.

United Artists first opened its 10-screen theater in the mall in 1997, 12 years after Twin Peaks Mall opened. Regal and UA later merged following a bankruptcy in 2001.

Monday will mark the first time in generations Longmont won't have a place to go see a movie on a big screen.

When Boulder County Business Hall of Fame member Richard "Dick" Klein moved to Longmont in 1960, he bought the Fox Theatre at 513 Main St. and renamed it the Trojan Theatre. The Fox had opened as Longmont's first movie house in 1938, according to Barry Tennis, whose family inherited an estate that contained some Longmont historical documents, including a flyer from the Fox's grand opening.

The Star-Vu Drive-In, at 1400 17th Ave. — near 17th and Bowen — dated back to at least 1951, according to Times-Call records.

Klein bought the Star-Vu in 1963 and operated it until 1986, when Commonwealth Theaters bought it from him and closed it. The Star-Vu was torn down two years after being closed.

Klein sold the Trojan to the Longmont Theater Co. in 1990.

Movies 1,2,3 was a movie house and video store that operated at 1800 Main St., where Goodwill and Sav-A-Lot are now, and the Courtyard 4 was in the Parkway Shopping Center. Both were owned by United Artists and both closed in the 1990s. United Artists' solidified its presence in Longmont with the 10-screen complex it opened in Twin Peaks Mall in 1997.

An aritst's rendering of the theater being built for Regal Entertainment Group at Village at the Peaks. The current theater will show its last movies Sunday, marking the closing of Twin Peaks Mall. (Courtesy NewMark Merrill Mountain States)

Knoxville, Tenn.-based Regal Entertainment Group will be one of the anchors at Village at the Peaks, along with Whole Foods and Sam's Club.

The company's new theater, which is being built by the property's owners, NewMark Merrill Mountain States, will be a 12-screen, state-of-the-art facility with plush recliner seats and footrests in all 12 auditoriums. One of the 12 rooms will offer moviegoers what the company calls the "Regal Premium Experience," which will feature and extra-large screen. That will be only the second RPX concept screen in the state, the other being in south Denver near Hampden Boulevard and Interstate 25.

The new cinema is projected to open in time for the holiday shopping season of 2015.

There was no word as of Wednesday from NewMark Merrill on what the official demolition date is for Twin Peaks Mall. Everything except for the Dillard's east building will be scraped to make room for the nearly $90 million Village at the Peaks.

For the record, the last picture show at Twin Peaks Mall, "Tammy," is an R-rated female road movie starring Melissa McCarthy and Susan Sarandon. According to imdb.com, "After losing her job and learning that her husband has been unfaithful, a woman hits the road with her profane, hard-drinking grandmother."

After the closing credits roll, that will officially pull the curtain on Twin Peaks Mall, which opened in 1985.

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